PORT TOWNSEND — With Kitsap Transit floating a Feb. 6 sales tax vote in Kitsap County to finance passenger ferry service, Port Townsend appears to in prime position to establish a weekend ferry run to Seattle.
“It would be an offshoot of what we’re doing in Kingston,” said Richard M. “Dick” Hayes, Kitsap Transit executive director.
Hayes spoke to about 20 people attending the Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce luncheon on Monday at Fort Worden State Park Commons, updating business leaders on the plan that could drastically change Puget Sound water transportation.
Proposed to about 200,000 voters in Kitsap County is a three-tenths of 1 cent tax increase to fund foot-ferry service linking Kingston, Bremerton, Port Orchard and Southworth with downtown Seattle.
Hayes and Tim Caldwell, Port Townsend Chamber of Commerce general manager, have been in close contact during the past three years in Caldwell’s efforts to establish Port Townsend and Port Ludlow foot ferry runs to Seattle.
PT run in 2008?
“By September 2008, we would hope to establish a Port Townsend to Keystone run,” Caldwell said after Hayes’ presentation.
Caldwell said weekend passengers could catch the ferry from Port Townsend to Kingston, then take the ferry connection that Kitsap Transit would run to Seattle.
A direct Port Townsend-Seattle weekend route is another possibility, Caldwell said.
“The weekend service market would determine if we do a year-round service,” he added.
Establishing such a route in 2008 would also benefit North Olympic Peninsula residents who face the six-week summer 2009 closure of the Hood Canal Bridge to replace its floating eastern half.
Kitsap Transit has been promoting the tax increase and has agreed to allow the private firm Aqua Express to manage its Kingston-to-Seattle run, should the sales tax proposal be approved.
Hayes said if the Port Townsend business community could finance its end of the deal, a weekend run could be established.
“We’ll have three boats for Kingston and would only be using one boat on the weekend, which would make it work in Port Townsend,” Hayes said.
